2007 June blog

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Because of the New York City gig with Harley-Davidson I sat down to think of which other major cities I have ridden in the world. London, Paris, Milan, Munich, LA, Dublin, Cape Town, Istanbul, Barcelona, Copenhagen are just some and now I get to add NY to that list. Today I added the video from the ride with Victory in Minnesota and Iowa on the Vision Tour and Street luxury tourers. Introducing on that video the latest song from Nonchalant UK featuring Charlie W Allen. It's a world exclusive just like the video itself that shows the Vision secrets. Charlie's my friend and I'm heading to his send off party to Paris this weekend. He'll be teaching students from the New York film academy how to sing and tackle stage fright for a couple of months. Might have time to visit him after the Paris Expo. Enjoy that video anyway. TS

I have had a date for quite a while in my calendar for the Harley-Davidson 2008 model year launch. July 18th is that date and it all happens in New York and York this time. I can't wait to finally ride a motorcycle in the Big apple. The theme will be cosmopolitan and that reflects one of the new motorcycles that we will ride in NY. Pretty cool stuff I'm sure you'll agree. TS

One week ago I rode 300 miles in 35 degrees in America, today we rode almost 300 miles in 12 degrees and constant showers from Brighton to Manchester. I was soaked before I had done 100 miles and made the first stop at Oxford services. At least we had tackled all the London A23 and M25 traffic now. But just when switching to the reserve fuel the America died on us on the soaked M40 motorway. Great I thought, could be in the shit now! But this is not the first time I've had a carburettor bike stop on me in the wet and it only happened after 110 miles of constant riding. Left it for a couple of minutes and started the engine fine again. But it happened once again just three miles away from the services we needed to stop at. Luckily it did start again this time after a couple of minutes too. The cause is obviously water that has penetrated somewhere it shouldn't be, but I don't know exactly where that would be yet. Will get some expert advice from Triumph later this week. We were absolutely soaked and freezing so had to make the stop a long one to dry up a bit and have plenty of warm drinks. I spent at least 30 minutes in front of the blow driers before moving on. Same story on the last stop just after Birmingham, but now the Bonnie behaved as it should and I didn't run it all the way down to the reserve either just to be safe... Arrived the final destination tonight in West Didsbury, Manchester at night and poured a warm bath to wake my ice cold and wet limbs back to life. I think I can say that this is the longest journey that I have ever done where I have been soaked almost the whole way. Not very pleasant when it rains every single mile of a long journey. Where did that English summer go? Hopefully it'll be back again soon... Tor

Checked in to our hotel in Worthing close to Goodwood with the Harley guys and Erik Buell late last night. After breakfast this morning Olivia and I headed from Worthing to Chichester and Goodwood on an 07 Harley-Davidson XL1200R Sportster leaving the Triumph Bonnie America at the hotel. Pillion comfort is not exactly the same on the Sportie as on the Bonnie. But the 1200cc V45 is still slightly more inspiring in standard trim than the 900cc parallel on the Triumph. The Bonneville America is very smooth whilst the XL1200R Sportster vibrates and makes more noise. We arrived at Goodwood, got our passes sorted and walked around the paddock area. Spent the day watching the Harley-Davidson XR1200 and XR750, Buell XBRR, Wakan 100, Confederate Wraith B120, BMW F800S Stunt bike, ex MotoGP Ilmor, Ducati race bikes, MV Agusta R312 and Vyrus bikes in the paddock and on track. Interviewed Erik Buell again. Unfortunately he couldn't race his XBRR at Goodwood as he had broken up an old injury in his knee. Possibly whilst testing the new Buell dirt-bike... Alan Cathcart has been told to bring leathers to Laguna Seca in August whilst Mr Buell told me that there's also a dirt-track at Laguna Seca... Will be exciting to finally get to know what sort of bike/bikes Buell will launch at Laguna in the end... I will be there to let you know off course. You never know who you'll bump into at Goodwood and one of the more exciting encounters for me was Pierre Terblanche. He was not at Goodwood on official duty for Ducati, but as punter. So had a chat about the Hypermotard project and motorcycle design in general. Pierre's currently working on three new projects for Ducati. This was my first visit to the Goodwood Festival of Speed, and I was in good company as this was the first year for both Erik Buell and Pierre Terblanche as well. Could easily become an annual event for me this. Luckily we got some sunny spells in between today before the thunderstorms arrived. Not much else to do for me then but hang out in the press room waiting for the showers to die down. It cleared up a bit by the afternoon and we headed back to Worthing to swap bikes back to the America and make our way further East along the coast to Brighton to visit friends. Thanks to Olivia Turley for taking a couple of these pictures. Tor

Right, moving very fast now and am today heading down to the Goodwood Festival of Speed on the Triumph America to check out events there. Should be plenty to photograph and do there. Updates coming. Then on Saturday I leave Goodwood for a couple of nights in Brighton before heading back to Manchester again. Next week I pick up the 2007 Honda CBR600RR for something different... See you around! TS

I'm back after having ridden the new Vision Touring bikes for about 500 miles in Minnesota and Iowa. The paradox is that all the material including my riding impressions carry a June 25th embargo! So despite one of the major secrets about the bike being revealed in American magazines right now I can't tell you until Monday! If you're in the states you can just pick up the latest issue of Motorcyclist where the advert on page 4-5 will tell you exactly how big the new engine is! Beats me! I will tell you about the launch day-by-day below, but wrap up what I can say now right here. It's been very hot in the Minneapolis area only broken up by some passing thunderstorms on Sunday. Early this morning we headed back to Minneapolis from Spirit Lake in Iowa in about 35 degrees Celsius (95F was the hottest I could read on the Vision display). We did mostly motorway miles today cruising at between 60-80Mph most of the way. We also visited the Victory factory this morning (after an early morning shoot Alan Cathcart, Cycle World and I attended) before riding 200 miles back to Minneapolis. The schedule has been very tight since it started on Monday afternoon and there was no downtime whatsoever scheduled in after the final leg of the ride. Just straight from 35 degrees hot weather into this weird Casino between Minneapolis city centre and the airport to get changed for the return flight (8 hours + for me). Then I found that our touring guide, Robert Pandaya (Indian Frank Zappa look-a-like) hadn't kept his promise to get my disc with my images ready for my return flight. That basically means FedEx after the official embargo and not as good service to you guys as usual. The launch itself has been great, but I am seriously worried why the photography service was much poorer on the 8 Million dollar Vision launch than on the 2007 model year line up launch last year in California. This is called shooting yourself in the foot. Hopefully I'll have some good shots, but only after making an effort to get them. So I believe that we all made our return flights in the end despite the surreal visit to this Casino in the middle of nowhere. Seriously, I asked myself several times what the hell am I doing here getting changed from riding clothes to flying clothes in a public Casino! So anyway, my return flight to Amsterdam was on schedule, taxied out to the runway and then reported they had engine problems. That took 2 hours to fix and I was now worried about my connecting flight from Amsterdam to Manchester. 11 hours later I was on my flight back to Manchester that I just made and now I'm here writing this. Pictures coming, but I can't use any new Vision shots until on Monday, yawn! Tor

Woke up at 6 O'clock with no alarm clock as I was eager to get checked out from the Graves 601 hotel, have a Starbucks and a fag and stuff my face with some eggs and bacon before riding out of Minneapolis on the Vision Tour at 8 O'clock. After having a coffee on the outside of the hotel whilst the guys were rolling the Visions out I had my slow mo' breakfast. Then headed back to the room to collect my bags that were to be transferred to a resort at Spirit Lake in Iowa whilst we rode there on the Vision tourers. Remembered to put the Victory Ipod Nano in my pocket to connect it to the Vision Tour sound system. A glorious day already I headed down to the bikes outside and picked one fully equipped one immediately and adopted it. Got some expert tuition on how to connect the Ipod and all the other Vision Tour functions. My bike was equipped with the adjustable windscreen, heated grips and seat, Satnav, stereo and radio receiver. All set to go! When all the journos (some with very little launch experience, the sort that will delay everyone at a press conference by asking tech details that always are in the press kit...) had picked a bike we rolled out of Minneapolis in the morning rush hour. First impressions was of a big but very manageable bike for its size. Not too different from the Honda Gold Wing or Triumph Rocket III Classic in that department then. I felt comfortable in the big seat straight away and looked forward to a long ride. 300 miles was scheduled crossing the Mississippi river several times down towards Iowa. Riding along the Mississippi was probably the biggest novelty for me during the launch. The big new 106 cubic inches (1734cc) V-twin thundered below the low seat and provided instant trust in low gears and easy cruising in sixth gear. The linked brakes felt like a powerful and ideal solution on the Vision Tour. On the motorways I played around with the cruise control to rest my right hand. The Vision Tour was stable enough to use cruise control with no hands at all speeds and always deactivated either by the use of the clutch or brakes. We did several photo stops on the way where only two photographers covered the whole group of 30 bikes where only half were journalists. I knew at that point that I had to organise something with the photographers on my own later. Unless I wanted very few shots of average quality. Victory had forgotten about the art in all this I think! Beautiful photography is very often just as important as the written word in this setting. If you expect a photographer to shoot motorcycle journalists like a Black water sniper merc shoots terrorists then you're just going to look like a turkey in the end. Reached Iowa in the end and Staff sergeant Pandaya kept shouting out orders about us having very little time to get to the MY08 presentation at Maxwell's Beach cafe. That's because we had made sure we got some good photography for you sir. Whilst having dinner at Maxwell's I had to run out and shoot that gorgeous sunset you can see on these pictures. Then after dinner Victory showed us all the new 2008 models. Which I can't tell you about until some time in July. If I forget to publish it by then, please remind me guys! Victory wants to show its dealer network before we go public with this you see. Spent the rest of the evening getting quotes from the key figures in the Victory team and drinking with Andrew Cherney (Motorcycle Cruiser) and Mark Tuttle Jr. (Rider). Cheers guys! More riding tomorrow. Tor  

You're going to love this when I finally will be allowed to publish material from this mammoth launch in the states. Victory Vision Tour Minneapolis picture gallery below.

I try again! This time with full waterproof suit, fully charged Motorola S9 stereo Bluetooth headset for music and in good spirit! Shit weather today as well, but not quite the monsoon like conditions of yesterday. The Bonnie America is the only modern Triumph that I have not yet tested (apart from the Street Triple 675, coming soon...) and I can now give you a few first impressions of it. I knew the engine would be well muffled in standard shape so that was no surprise. The America feels fairly light on its toe without being a particularly lightweight motorcycle. The front feels very willing despite it being slightly raked out and it steers well. The seat and forward mounted foot controls are much more relaxed than a sporty T100. I still felt a touch of decent handling when I upped the pace a bit in the Peak District. Due to very heavy winds and unpleasant weather I only stopped very briefly and shot two shots of the bike on the way back from Hinckley. More pictures coming soon. TS

Even an experienced motorcycle journalist can make stupid decisions like planning to head all the way from Manchester to Hinckley in monsoon rain only wearing jeans and leather jacket. I had planned to pick up the 07 Bonneville America today, but it started raining heavy just after 10 miles riding. So decided that I couldn't take 90 odd more miles of this as I was already soaked. So I stopped, gave Triumph a ring to reschedule for tomorrow, wearing my Gore-Tex stuff rather than jeans. TS

It's not all motorcycling all the time even though the weather has been perfect this weekend. Went camping with gorgeous Olivia Turley this weekend. Some walks in the Peak District, good food (not ducklings) and fresh eggs in the morning. Can't get better than that! TS

I have been surrounded by builders and electricians this past week finishing the new bathroom in the house that I live in. One guy came in and started building a new wall first in the bathroom. Then he would stop working as the electrician needed to do some work before the builders could finish. Then the electrician got ill for the first two days in his life (or so he said...) and a half finished bathroom just stood there. Then he would finally arrive and finish some more work, but only enough for the builders to continue. So the next morning the builders are back until they run out of tiles. The next day they came back with more tiles and finished. Then a couple of days later the builders arrived again with a frameless bath screen, but couldn't mount it until the electrician came back to do something more. Then the electrician came back and finished his end, but told me that we couldn't actually use the new shower until another guy with a special certificate came back and fixed the fuse box. Today the builders mounted the screen so now I only wait for the fuse guy. Efficiency is the clue here. Next Wednesday I am picking up the 07 Triumph America. The America is the missing link in my Triumph portfolio and a reader requested this test from me this morning. So now I'm going to do just that. Fuel injection is due for all the Triumph Classics from next year so it will be sort of the last new carburettor fuelled motorcycle that I will ever ride. I have also arranged for UK road tests of the KTM 690SM, Honda CBR600RR, BMW HP2 Megamoto and G650 Xchallenge in June/July. June 16th I fly from Manchester to Amsterdam and from Amsterdam to Minneapolis for the 2008 Victory Vision Tour & Street world launches. July 18th there's some Harley-Davidson stuff brewing. What and where info coming soon. Then when I arrive back from the US (June 21) I head straight down to the Goodwood Festival of Speed to cover events. And I just got what I suspect to be a very important Buell date at Laguna Seca in California in late August. I have strong reasons to believe that this involves the first ever liquid-cooled Buell motorcycle. That's very significant and in the backroom I hear whisperings about Rotax engines... A Buell with a 140bhp liquid cooled V-twin on Laguna Seca? That's irresistible! In between all this I will also test the all new 2008 Triumph Street Triple. It will be a busy summer, I am already having the time of my life here in sunny Chorlton. But this summer looks set to beat all records! I know that my lifestyle is enviable, but it's been a long way to get here. Hasta luego! TS

Got an early start to the week today. Woke up at 06:00 and finished the videos from the Shiver launch, Bandit 1250 and GSX-R1000 tests. I have added the Shiver onboard video 2, the launch and press stuff video from Italy and the Bandit 1250S with village idiot, photographer and sales guy Martin Leyfield in it below. Enjoy! Tor